Introduction & Definitions…

I chose Dramatic Elements as to me it’s one of the most important ingredients of a game, the one which if the game was without it would fail.

Within Dramatic Elements there are a lot of questions to explore…

Why do gamers connect to games?
Why do gamers like playing a game over and over again?
Why do digital games now have so much following and interest?

The answers all lie within Dramatic Elements.

Ok so what are Dramatic Elements? Well let’s imagine a world without them, here’s a video I created to illustrate…

This is a story void of any dramatic elements and you can see how dull it is. Dramatic Elements give a digital game, its life and soul. They are what places a player in the world (be that a literal of figurative world) that the game designer has created, dramatic elements makes a player emotionally invest in a game and care for the outcome. I don’t think anyone would care too much what would happen to 0001 or 0011.

Let’s talk a little about the history of digital games. So were there always dramatic elements in games?
In a way, yes. Even the very first games like Spacewar, Asteroids and Space invaders had what is called a ‘framing’ narrative. A basic premise that the player is given

  - Spot the narrative? It's not easy.

In Asteroids that framing narrative is that you are a defending earth from asteroids and similarly in Space invaders you are a ship defending Earth from an alien attack.

Some early games, such as ‘Zork’ were entirely text-based and though the dramatic elements and narrative were not there visually, there was a lot of backstory in the game which grounded the player in it’s fictional world. It had a strong premise and like Asteroids, who’s premise was simple it made the gameplay meaningful.

So what is premise in terms of digital games?

Well, premise in digital games, is the same as premise, movies, books and any other media. It’s composed of five elements…

• Time – When the game takes place.
• Place – Where the game takes place
• Character – Who is involved in the story of the game
• Objective – What must the protagonist do?
• Action – What stands in the protagonist’s way?

Let’s take a game like Capcom’s Resident Evil for example…

Time = Modern day

Place = A mansion in Racoon City, a small town in the US

Character = Chris Redfield & Jill Valentine are the main protagonists

Objective = Survive a zombie infested mansion and destroy a virus before it spreads.

Action = Numerous zombies and other mutated creatures

Narrative and Narrative Wars

“A major factor in the evolution of computer games – after obvious technological advances – is the increasing importance of storytelling” (Thomson et al, 2007:28).

Although this quote would make Markku Eskelinen (we’ll get to him later) uncomfortable, it’s hard to deny that it’s difficult to go into a digital games shop and pick up a game that doesn’t have a narrative. For instance, according to John Sachem who writes for Associated Content (2009), these are the top 10 selling games for the Xbox 360 at the first half of the year...

1) Resident Evil 5
2) UFC 2009 Undisputed
3) Call of Duty: World at War
4) Halo Wars
5) Street Fighter IV
(Sachem [online] 2009)

Three out of five of those have a strong narrative and even Street Fighter has a narrative albeit a tenuous one. Though in fairness if the term ‘narrative’ isn’t accurately defined then pretty much anything can be a narrative. For our purposes I will define narrative as the story of the game and how that story is told.

In many modern games the narrative, both the backstory and the story that unfolds is extremely detailed. Some games, though at face value would seem quite void of backstory and narrative, actually have it in abundance. Take Tekken for instance, just a fighting game right? No real narrative or backstory right? Wrong. The game itself is centred around the fictional ‘King of Iron Fist Tournament’ held by the head of a powerful multinational organisation. The winner of the tournament gains control and owner ship of the organisation.

Each of the now 40+ individual players have their own reasons and agenda for entering the competition. The character Jin Kazama was the illegitimate son of two of the contestants and he enters the completion for revenge against the head of the corporation who may have been his father. Home and Away couldn’t beat storylines like that.

Fig 1

There’s an absolute wealth of detailed narrative in digital games, a lot more than people think. Perhaps that’s why the movie industry is increasingly looking to digital games for inspiration. At present there are over 50 movies based on games and with another 10 in development (Wikipedia [online] 2008).

This well of narrative is what is inspiring the creation of 64 game-based novels, 50 comic books and 124 TV shows.
Narrative in games became something of a very sore point a while ago, under the overall umbrella of digital game studies, two camps emerged; the Ludologists and the Narratologists.

Fig 2

Narratologists such as Janet Murray believed that narrative in digital games should be looked at in the same way as novels and forms of linear media such as films, in that they tell stories. This standpoint was looked into in greater detail by books by Brenda Laurel and Janet Murray who wrote the highly influential ‘Hamlet on the Holodeck’.

In the other camp Ludologists such as Jesper Juul and Markku Eskelinen believed that games were not the place to tell stories at all and that the use of narrative in games was detracting to the gaming experience.

Here’s a transcript from Markku Eskelinen on the debate…

“It's quite relaxing to write about computer games as nothing too much has been said yet, and almost anything goes¹. The situation is pretty much the same in hat comes to writing about games and gaming in general. The sad fact with alarming cumulative consequences is that they are under-theorized, there are Huizinga, Caillois and Ehrmann of course, and libraries full of board game tudies, in addition to game theory and bits and pieces of philosophy, most notably those of Wittgenstein's, but they won't get us very far with computer games. So if there already is or soon will be a legitimate field for compute game studies, this field is also very open to intrusions and colonisations from the already organized scholarly tribes. Resisting and beating them is the goal of our first survival game in this paper as what these emerging studies need is independence, or at least relative independence.

It should be self-evident that we can't apply print narratology, theory, film or theatre and drama studies directly to computer games, but it isn't². Therefore the majority of the random notes and power-ups that follow will be spent modifying the presuppositions firmly based on the academic denial of helplessness. Obviously I need a strategy, and fortunately I have one: to use the theories of those would-be-colonisers against themselves. For example, as we shall soon see, if you actually know your narrative theory (instead of resorting to outdated notions of Aristotle, Propp or Victorian novels) you won't argue that games are (interactive or procedural) narratives or anything even remotely similar³. Luckily, outside theory, people are usually excellent at distinguishing between narrative situations and gaming situations: if I'll throw a ball I don't expect you to drop it and wait until it starts telling stories.
It's good we don't have to start from scratch, as there have been attempts to locate, describe and analyse the basic components and aspects of the gaming situation, essentially different from the basic constituents of narrative and dramatic situations. I'm thinking here of Chris Crawford's early classic The Art of Computer Game Design, Gonzalo Frasca's and Jesper Juul's papers on ludology, and most of all Espen Aarseth's articles on computer games and cybertext theory⁴.

First of all, I'd like to demonstrate or test a safe and painless passage from narratives to games by trying to exhaust classic narratology (Genette, Chatman, Prince). Most naive comparisons between narratives and games usually result from too narrow, broad or feeble definitions of the former: usually it comes down to discovering "plots" and "characters" in both modes (in games and in narratives).

However, we should know that's not good enough as we can find those events and existents also in drama that is clearly its own mode. The minimal definition of narrative derived from Gerald Prince and Gerard Genette states basically that there must be two things or components to constitute a narrative: a temporal sequence of events (a plot if you want to water the concept down) and a narrative situation (with both narrators and narratees for starters). I think we can safely say we can't find narrative situations within games. (Or if and when we sometimes do, most probably in Myst or The Last Express, the narrative components are then at the service of an ergodic dominant).⁵

To be brief: a story, a back-story or a plot is not enough. A sequence of events enacted constitutes a drama or a performance, a sequence of events recounted constitutes a narrative, and perhaps a sequence of events produced or played out under certain circumstances and following formal rules constitutes a game. This is really very trivial but crucial: there are sequences of events that do not become or form stories (like in Tetris for example). The reason for this is equally simple: in games the dominant temporal relation is the one between user time and event time and not the narrative one between story time and discourse time.

In what comes to the fallacy of recognizing similar characters or existents in games, drama and narratives, the situation is pretty much the same. In computer games you can operate your character if there is any in the first place, perhaps also discuss with other characters or voices, and the characters can be dynamic and developing or changing themselves with level points and power-ups. These entities are definitely not acting or behaving like traditional narrators, characters, directors and actors, their supposed counterparts in literature and film and on stage.⁶

To sum up: different existents, different event structures, and different situations. On the other hand narratology is not completely useless, if its key concepts and distinctions are not taken for granted but traced back to their roots. In the following that's exactly what we'll try to do. The elementary categories of classic narratology are transformed into an open series of ludological components⁷, if not for any other reason than to further specify the features inherent to games.”

(Eskelinen, [online] 2005)

¹ Wheresas Eskelinen does have a certain freedom with his topic; it is far from a new field without research or study.
² Eskelinen shows typical single-mindedness and almost assumes the reader of his text to have the same Ludologist view.
³ Here, true to form, Eskelinen begins to show aggressiveness in his statements defaming those with an opposing view.
⁴ In this sentence Eskelinen only makes reference to fellow Ludologists and leaves out any mention of other great writers on the subject.
⁵ Eskelinen makes a statement then contradicts himself as he states there are no games with narrative, then goes on to mention ones that have.
⁶ Eskelinen rebukes the idea that game characters have any similarity to traditional narrative characters.
⁷ Through deft definitions Eskelinen turns narratology into his idea of Ludology.

Eskelinen was one of the ‘Narrative Wars’ most outspoken warriors, he was one of the people who began to make the normally genial academic debates more and more heated. Eskelinen starts off amiably enough with the broad statement that digital games are an under-appreciated media and deserve far more academic study although I don’t think he is correct in saying that ‘nothing much has been said yet, as there had already been excellent books and texts written on the subject such as.

However Eskilenen then quickly goes on to assail the viewpoint that narrative in digital games cannot be looked at in the same way as it is studied in film and theatre (which is the basis of narratology). In my opinion, certain games have a linear narrative that is exactly like films and theatre and can be studied as such with the same principles and approach.

I find it quite odd that he was only able to find what he calls ‘narrative situations’ in Myst and The Last Express (a game which was released in 1997 and was famous or possibly notorious for trying to emulate linear ‘real-time’. Fellow Ludologist Jesper Juul also writes about this game in his text ‘Readings: Five versions of a conflict’ (Juul, [online] no date). I think there are several other games, which although not strictly linear, can definitely be said to have a perfectly fluid narrative situation such as the obvious Final Fantasy series which I will discuss in greater detail later.

Narrative Continued….

Following on from Eskelinen, people such as Eric Zimmerman, Katie Salen and Henry Jenkins tried to heal the rift between Ludology and Narratology (although Eskelinen is still stubbornly holding fast) by acknowledging and incorporating both schools of thought and in modern times it’s generally accepted that both schools of thought have merit.

Henry Jenkins believed in the merit of the compromise…

“I find myself responding to this perspective with mixed feelings. On the one hand, I understand what these writers are arguing against -- various attempts to map traditional narrative structures ("hypertext," "Interactive Cinema," "nonlinear narrative") onto games at the expense of an attention to their specificity as an emerging mode of entertainment. You say "narrative" to the average gamer and what they are apt to imagine is something on the order of a choose-your-own adventure book, a form noted for its lifelessness and mechanical exposition rather than enthralling entertainment, thematic sophistication, or character complexity. And game industry executives are perhaps justly skeptical that they have much to learn from the resolutely unpopular (and often overtly antipopular) aesthetics promoted by hypertext theorists.

The application of film theory to games can seem heavy-handed and literal-minded, often failing to recognize the profound differences between the two media. Yet, at the same time, there is a tremendous amount that game designers and critics could learn through making meaningful comparisons with other storytelling media¹. One gets rid of narrative as a framework for thinking about games only at one's own risk. In this short piece, I hope to offer a middle-ground position between the ludologists and the narratologists, one that respects the particularity of this emerging medium -- examining games less as stories than as spaces ripe with narrative possibility.

Let's start at some points where we might all agree:

1. Not all games tell stories. Games may be an abstract, expressive, and experiential form, closer to music or modern dance than to cinema. Some ballets (The Nutcracker for example) tell stories, but storytelling isn't an intrinsic or defining feature of dance². Similarly, many of my own favorite games -- Tetris, Blix, Snood -- are simple graphic games that do not lend themselves very well to narrative exposition.

Eskelinen (2001) takes Janet Murray to task for her narrative analysis of Tetris as "a perfect enactment of the overtasked lives of Americans in the 1990s -- of the constant bombardment of tasks that demand our attention and that we must somehow fit into our overcrowded schedules and clear off our desks in order to make room for the next onslaught." Eskelinen is correct to note that the abstraction of Tetris would seem to defy narrative interpretation, but that is not the same thing as insisting that no meaningful analysis can be made of the game and its fit within contemporary culture. Tetris might well express something of the frenzied pace of modern life, just as modern dances might, without being a story. To understand such games, we need other terms and concepts beyond narrative, including interface design and expressive movement for starters. The last thing we want to do is to reign in the creative experimentation that needs to occur in the earlier years of a medium's development.

2. Many games do have narrative aspirations. Minimally, they want to tap the emotional residue of previous narrative experiences. Often, they depend on our familiarity with the roles and goals of genre entertainment to orient us to the action, and in many cases, game designers want to create a series of narrative experiences for the player. Given those narrative aspirations, it seems reasonable to suggest that some understanding of how games relate to narrative is necessary before we understand the aesthetics of game design or the nature of contemporary game culture³.

3. Narrative analysis need not be prescriptive, even if some narratologists -- Janet Murray is the most oft-cited example -- do seem to be advocating for games to pursue particular narrative forms. There is not one future of games. The goal should be to foster diversification of genres, aesthetics, and audiences, to open gamers to the broadest possible range of experiences. The past few years have been ones of enormous creative experimentation and innovation within the games industry, as might be represented by a list of some of the groundbreaking titles. The Sims, Black and White, Majestic, Shenmue; each represents profoundly different concepts of what makes for compelling game play. A discussion of the narrative potentials of games need not imply a privileging of storytelling over all the other possible things games can do, even if we might suggest that if game designers are going to tell stories, they should tell them well. In order to do that, game designers, who are most often schooled in computer science or graphic design, need to be retooled in the basic vocabulary of narrative theory.

4. The experience of playing games can never be simply reduced to the experience of a story⁴. Many other factors that have little or nothing to do with storytelling per se contribute to the development of great games and we need to significantly broaden our critical vocabulary for talking about games to deal more fully with those other topics. Here, the ludologist's insistence that game scholars focus more attention on the mechanics of game play seems totally in order.

5. If some games tell stories, they are unlikely to tell them in the same ways that other media tell stories⁵. Stories are not empty content that can be ported from one media pipeline to another. One would be hard-pressed, for example, to translate the internal dialogue of Proust's Remembrance of Things Past into a compelling cinematic experience, and the tight control over viewer experience that Hitchcock achieves in his suspense films would be directly antithetical to the aesthetics of good game design. We must, therefore, be attentive to the particularity of games as a medium, specifically what distinguishes them from other narrative traditions. Yet, in order to do so requires precise comparisons -- not the mapping of old models onto games but a testing of those models against existing games to determine what features they share with other media and how they differ.”

(Jenkins, [online] no date).

¹ Jenkins begins his article stating that both viewpoints have valid theory and reasoning behind them.
² This is an excellent analogy as it shows the view that just as ballet may have stories, they shouldn’t be judged on story alone, just as digital games though they may tell a story shouldn’t be judged on story alone.
³Jenkins states the importance of encompassing narrative into the study of digital games.
⁴ Jenkins reminds the reader that no digital game can be said to be just a narrative story as there are too many elements such as interactivity involved.
⁵ He then continues to explain that digital games have a unique way of telling the story.

The above piece by Henry Jenkins is a response to one of Markku Eskelinen’s many tirades against Ludology and indeed Ludologists. Jenkins immediately starts the piece by stating that he can see both viewpoints and agrees with the Lugological standpoint to a degree if narratology were to be the only way games should be viewed as a medium. He soon goes on to state the benefit of the middle ground, that they are benefits of the viewing of the narrative in digital games as the same as film, theatre etc. by stating there is much to be learned from that viewpoint and that is should not be dismissied offhand.

Jenkins’ piece is the complete antithesis of Eskelinen’s aggressive article. He tries to sooth Eskilinen by stating his He takes the standpoint that Eric Zimmerman and Katie Salen take as well, that the Narratology Vs Ludology debate need not be a Fire Vs Ice issue, that there is a middle ground where both would be applied in the study of video games and that the study of video games would benefit from the middle ground.

Jenkins is certain to point out that narrative is not the only lens through which digital games should be viewed as it would detract from the study as a whole but that it is definitely something that should be taken into consideration.

From this article it is not surprising that this viewpoint would soon be the one that would be accepted by digital game theorists and designers as a whole.

In digital games there are two types of narrative, embedded and emergent:

Embedded narrative is where there is a pre-defined story arc put in place by the designers; this is in the majority of games. These games are the ones that have a linear structure closer to the ones in films and theatre. Examples of embedded narrative are games such as the aforementioned Resident Evil series, Assassins’ Creed etc.

Emergent narrative is when there is no story arc and the story of the game transpires as a direct result of the actions of the player. Games that exemplify this are ones the The Sims.

Character

“All the world's a stage, And all the men and women merely players”

(Shakespeare, 2008:69)

An odd quote to use? Perhaps, but I think it’s a pertinent one as it speaks about the difference between being an observer and being a participant which is important in the context of Character in digital games.

Character is an equally important part of a game, as they are what connects the player to the game. Successful games have a character that the player empathizes with on some level. There are two types of characters in digital games:

Avatars: Which is a player designed and customized. They are seen mainly in games like the Sims and City of Heroes

Characters: Which are created by the designers and have motives and backstories.

The best characters in digital games are usually ones we can identify with on some level or else have a level of depth that we can empathise with. In a poll by Gamewad, the most popular digital game character of all time was said to be Solid Snake from Metal Gear Solid (Gamewad [online] 2007). This is interesting as Solid Snake is created to be a lot more than a two dimensional representation of the player such as Mario. Solid Snake has a very distinct character and an extremely detailed backstory. The designers have made it so that Solid Snake’s backstory is revealed throughout the course of the game much like the Bourne films.
There is another character that is designed in detail although in another way and that is Gordon Freeman from ‘Half-Life’…

(You Tube, [online] 2009).

Although it may appear to be just another FPS in the clip, Gordon is designed differently. As you can see from the clip, Gordon never speaks. This design was a first in games of this type, especially as the game story was very detailed and there would need to be interaction between player and environment and other characters.

The game designers deliberately made the first person character mute so that the player is more immersed in the character. Similarly, all through the game there are no cut scenes so the player retains complete control of Gordon at all times. The designers thought that cut-scenes would detract from the illusion of immersion and that if he spoke it would impose a character on the player that they didn’t necessarily want. The same went for the fact that originally the designers did not want the player to see what Gordon looked like and were only forced to show him when they made the multi-player mode. When interviewed Marc Laidlaw, the writer of the game says “We just wanted to create somebody who didn't get in the way of the player exploring on their own yet feeling like they had a specific role - never quite sure that they were playing it right, but having it as part of the whole experience” (Laidlaw[Online] 2006). He goes on to explain in an interview with uk.pc.gamespy.com that “The main thing was not to put too much detail into really specific things about this character because we always wanted the player to help create who he was” (Tuttle [online] 2008).

The idea was a victory, as not only was the game extremely well received but critics praised the way that the character was portrayed in the game. So it would seem that sometimes deliberately not creating a character can be just as effective as creating one. The character must have had a strong impact…

Again to use narratology and compare digital games with film, often the best digital game characters are flawed and humanised. The titular character in ‘Ico’ stands out as he has weaknesses and is quite frail. Similarly Carla Valenti in the game ‘Fahrenheit’ stands out and seems much more rounded as she has several character flaws such as she is claustrophobic and predisposed to panic-attacks.

Obviously not all characters in the game need to be rounded and have a strong and definable persona as Jack Walters from ‘Call of Cthulhu’ or the ones above. NPC’S (Non Playable Characters) in a game don’t always need this level of detail but should at least be able to interact with the protagonist in a way that is believable for their character.

Of course not all games utilise a defined character for instance there are no characters in Forza or Tetris.

Jim Thompson (2007) agrees with this and writes “The designer must be aware of any characters significance within the game. NPC’s who are seen briefly do not need much character development and may only need superficial details of their personalities worked out. However, the player character and major NPC’s do need careful consideration” (Thompson 2007:95)

Making the characters especially the playable ones as human as possible (even if they are inhuman) is the key to connecting the player with the game emotionally and makes the challenges the characters face have a greater emotional impact.

Speaking of Challenge…

Challenge, Play and Challenging play

If character is what connects you to a game then challenge is what keeps you there.

In digital games there needs to be a fine line between a game which is too easy to play and a game which is too hard. This line must also be on an upward climb as the player’s ability level and skills in the game will increase the more he or she plays. Csikszentmihalyi, a psychologist studying play, created the flow diagram to illustrate this balance, show below…

Csikszentmihalyi explains that the flow is most abundant in games which are goal oriented and with clear rules.
Once the ‘flow’ is entered Salen and Zimmerman (2004) write that a number of this happen to the player such as ‘Concentration on the task at hand’, ‘The Paradox of Control’, ‘The Loss of Self-Consciousness’ and ‘The Transformation of Time’ (2004: 89).

Of course with successful games, the player’s skills must be tested and pushed for the player to remain interested. With this in mind several game companies are attempting to find new ways to keep adept players involved in the game without their getting bored. A paper was written recently by Julian Togelias et al at the University of Essex proposing a race track using evolutionary algorithms which would evolve and expand to the player’s skill level.

For instance the tracks below evolved from a straight track to the player’s ability level. Track (a) on the left, for a beginner and track (b) on the right for a more skilled player.

(Adapted from Togelius et al [online] 2006).

This type of game which evolves to the player’s skill level was also adapted by the creators of Left 4 Dead who created an AI ‘Director’ for their game. The AI logs each players amount of ‘supplies’ their points and current representative health state and the AI will add enemies and supplies and even alter the music to challenge the player so that each playthrough is different and the player is never bored. In the second game ‘Left 4 Dead 2’ the AI was upgraded so that as well as enemies and supplies being adapted to the players performance level to include the adaption of the lighting level, the walls and even the weather.

The following is an excerpt from an interview with Chet Falizek, one of the writers:

Shack: Can you talk more about the changes to the dynamic systems in Left 4 Dead 2?

Chet Faliszek: So, the AI director, there are some really noticeable ones. We're giving it control over the weather now. Now you go from [a sunny day] to holy crap man, I can't see anyone around me. It's like the Blood Harvest cornfield, right.

Dynamic pathing changes--so in the next map in this campaign, they go through an above-ground cemetery, a haunted old cemetery with crypts above ground, and it actually changes the path every time you play. And also how spawning the creatures, and the pacing of the game.

One of the things we look at with people playing online, are people playing the game-- the stacking in the corner.. that sucks!

Shack: Absolutely.

Chet Faliszek: It sucks that there are people that don't play it that way, and they get yelled at.

Shack: Oh, I know. I'm always the guy--there are the three guys in the corner, and then I'm the guy standing over there, and they say, "Come onnn!"

Chet Faliszek: The way you want to play it, the fun way, is the best way to play it, too. So to do that, there are just a lot of subtle changes to make, in how the director handles what it's going to spawn, and how it thinks about attacking the survivors (Breckon and Faylor [online] 2009).

This AI adaptive play may become much more commonplace in the future. So the old system of levels ending with boss may become obsolete and the future may be a game whose structure and system is entirely different from one player to the next. Imagine a game where a beginner plays a game where the path is varied but not impossible and they reach a 8ft foot boss at the end with just the right ammunition to defeat them after a few difficult attempts and then a skilled player plays the same sequence and the path is more complex with more puzzles and the boss is twice the size, faster and smarter an embodiment of the games AI system.

This brings us on to…

Play:

Although the definitions of play are the contents of another blog for another time it’s worth noting that Play, like the term ‘games’ is one of the hardest to define. However with regards to dramatic elements ‘play’ is best described as the freedom of movement within a rigid structure, that structure being the rules of the game. In Dramatic Elements there are two types of game…

Games of Emergence

Which are games which may have a simple set of rules but may create complex play, forming a large ‘game tree’. Fullerton (2008) states “In fact, in many cases, very simple rule sets, when set in motion, can beget unpredictable results” (2008: 57).

Games of Progression

These are games which by and large have more narrative to them and which the game designer creates a direct sequence of challenges for the player. An example of this type of game is Activision’s Prototype.

These blogs I hope have detailed some of the many facets of dramatic elements.

I'll end with this quote...

"Although the media palette of game design has grown to rival film and television, it is clear that the emotional impact of games still has not achieved the depths it is capable of and that will make it recognised as an important dramatic art form" (Fullerton and Zimmerman, 2008:106).

Critical Evaluation

I chose Dramatic Elements for my project and I’m still glad I did , I chose the subject initially as I had a strong interest in the narrative of games, particularly with reference to the story structure. I was interested in how the stories are chosen, how they are interpreted for games and the future of these narrative-centric games. I started thinking was this interest in narrative games a new thing for me, or did I always like them? For instance I listed my favourite modern games…

Resident Evil
Silent Hill
Prototype
Wanted
Abe’s Odyssey
Bioshock

I then compared them to games I had played when I was younger such as Batman, Ghostbusters and Airwolf. I realised that although they didn’t have a detailed narrative, they still had a narrative that I could engross myself in. Perhaps at the time this was because I loved imaging myself as the characters. I noticed that asides from most of them being action games, the large majority of them have a strong narrative. Looking back at the games I enjoyed when I was younger, I think it’s more than a coincidence that all the games I enjoyed best are rich with narrative.

What I didn’t realise was how much more there was to Dramatic Elements, it was more than just narrative alone and I also discovered just how in-depth narrative was (or how hotly debated a topic it is).

When I chose dramatic elements, I also chose the topic from the list of alternatives because I had briefly looked into the amount of information there was on the subject and I found that there was a lot of research that I could look into and use in my blog.
Whilst researching for the blog, I found more information than I could ask for on the topic of narrative but surprisingly little in terms of the other areas of dramatic elements such as Emergence and Progression other than in the ‘course bibles’, Games Design Workshop, 2008 by Tracy Fullerton and Eric Zimmerman and Rules of Play, 2004 by Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman.

One of the things I appreciated while doing research was that many of the people I was researching are still very much active in the subject, Henry Jenkins still writes excellent articles on the dramatic elements of digital games, Eric Zimmerman still updates his blog and his very useful newly-formed website which I came across www.localno12.com. Thankfully dramatic elements in digital games are a continually evolving subject. This continuous evolution in dramatic elements is also true for the technology in digital games as well and I think anyone researching the subject in the next year or so would be able to say a great deal more on the subject as it seems the AI within games (such as I wrote about on the Left 4 Dead games) will be far greater advanced than it is now.

The part of my blog that I enjoyed the most was my research into the narrative debate as even though I knew that they are considered a dead debate and that digital games can be judged on their content of narrative but that it is just one of many aspects in a game, I found myself coming down on a side and taking a standpoint in a debate, rather like I was taking up arms in a long over war. I found the arguments by Zimmerman, Murray et al very interesting and completely agreed with standpoint that narrative could be judged on its narrative in just the same way that a film, play or book can be.

I also enjoyed looking into character in video games as I had read a few interviews before out character creation in digital games and they had been very sparse, almost skirting over the issue. It was as though very little thought had been given to this area and I believed a lot more could be done with it. The research on greatest game characters seemed not to truly show which characters were the most intriguing or complex, rather it showed which ones were the most kitsch or ‘zany’. I was disappointed with these findings as my thoughts were that truly great digital game characters, ones whose persona would stay with the gamer in the same way that a film character like Andy DuFresne from The Shawshank Redemption or Atticus Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird would. I believe these game characters are still to come.

The part of the blog that I found most difficult was the research into play as it relates to dramatic elements as I found this would often cross the line into research on formal elements. The line was very hard to draw and most articles and information I read would be on Play as a formal element rather than a dramatic element and I wanted my blog on point as much as possible.

I tried to use as many varied sources as possible, books, online blogs, video-blogs, TV shows and even other graduates articles to make my blog a varied piece containing different opinions and approaches.

In future blogs I will try to incorporate Twitter Blogs from people on the subject, I had planned on incorporating one with this blog but the people who did have current twitter accounts either hadn’t updated them in quite some time (Janet Murray’s Twitter still says she is stuck at LAX from October – I really hope she’s out of there two months later) or they rarely Twitter about the specific subject.

I hope this Blog had something new to say on Dramatic Elements.

Bibliography & Ludography

Bateman, C and Boon, R, (2006), 21^st Century game design, Massachusetts, Charles River Media

Breckon, N and Faylor, C, (2009), Left for dead interview, [online] Available from http://www.shacknews.com/featuredarticle.x?id=1138&page=2 accessed on 10.11.2009

Eskelinen, M, (2005), Introduction to Ludology and Narratology, [online] Available from http://www.electronicbookreview.com/thread/firstperson/anticolonial accessed on 5.12.2009

Fullerton, T and Zimmerman, E, (2008), Game Design Workshop: A playcentric approach to creating innovative games, Burlington, Elsevier

Jenkins, H, (no date), Game design as Narrative Architecture, [online] Available from http://web.mit.edu/cms/People/henry3/games&narrative.html accessed on 3.12.2009

Juul,J,(no date) Readings, Five versions of a conflict [online] Available from http://www.jesperjuul.net/thesis/6-readings.html accessed on 6.12.2009

Laidlaw, M, (2006), Valve Software's plot man and the guy who puts story in front of the crowbar, [online] Available from http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=152674 accessed on 19.12.2009

Sachem, J (2009) The top ten bestselling video games, [online] Available from http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/2481336/the_top_10_best_selling_video_games.html accessed on 11.12.2009

Salen, K and Zimmerman, E, (2004), Rules of Play: Games design fundaments, USA, Massachusetts Institute of Tchnology

Shakespeare, W, (2008), As you Like it, Plain Label Books

Thomson, J, Berbank- Green, B and Cusworth, N, (2007), The Computer game design course: principles, practices and techniques for the aspiring game designer, London, Thames and Hudson

Togelius, J, De Nardi, R and Lucas, S, (2006), Towards automatic personalised content creation for racing games, Essex

Tuttle, W, (2008), Half Life: 10^th Anniversary Interview, [online] Available from http://uk.pc.gamespy.com/pc/half-life/932135p1.html accessed on 16.11.2009

Wikipedia, (2008), List of films based on video games, [online] Available from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_based_on_video_games accessed on 10.12.2009

You Tube, (2009), Half Life 1: In game play, [online] Available from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EajuivR5kGk accessed on 4.12.2009

Ludography

Asteroids, [1979], Atari, [Atari]

Black and White, [2001], Electronic Arts, [PC/MAC]

Call of Cthulhu, [1981], Chaosium, [PC]

Call of Duty: World at War, [2009], Activision, [PC, Playstation 3, Wii/ Xbox 360]

City of Heroes, [2005], NCsoft, [PC]

Fahrenheit, [2005], Atari, [Xbox/Playstation]

Half Life, [1998], Sierra Entertainment/Electronic Arts, [Windows/Xbox/Playstation]

Halo Wars, [2009], Microsoft Game Studios, [Xbox 360]

Left 4 Dead, [2008], Valve Corporation, [PC/Xbox 360]

Majestic, [2001], Electronic Arts, [PC]

Metal Gear Solid, [1998], Konami, [Playstation/Windows]

Myst, [1993], Broderbund, [PC]

Prototype, [2009], Activision, [Playstation/Xbox 360/Windows]

Resident Evil, [1996], Capcom, [Playstation]

Resident Evil 5, [2009], Capcom, [Playstation/Xbox 360]

Shenmue, [1999], Sega, [Dreamcast]

Snood, [1996], Snood World, [PC]

Street Fighter IV, [2009], Capcom, [Playstation 3/Xbox 360]

Tetris, [1984], various, [Home computer/Gameboy]

The Last Express, [1997], Broderbund, [Windows/MAC OS/DOS]

The Sims, [2000], Electronic Arts, [PC]

UFC 2009 Undisputed, [2009], THQ, [Xbox 360/Playstation 3]

Zork, [1980], Infocom, [PC]

Images

Fig 1: Elements from images from www.unrealitytv.com and www.juegoconsolas.com

Fig 2: Elements of images from www.wired.com and www.julielenzerkirk.com